Romania’s government plans to sell a minority stake in utility Transgaz SA in mid-September after delaying it from the end of June because of Europe’s sovereign- debt crisis and the Balkan nation’s political turmoil.
The Bucharest-based government, which pledged to the International Monetary Fund and the European to sell minority or majority stakes in energy companies this year, will try to offer a 15 percent stake in its natural-gas grid operator next month, Finance Minister Florin Georgescu told reporters in Bucharest today, after a meeting with the international lenders.
“We will go ahead with planned stake sales and the appointment of private managers in state-owned companies,” Georgescu said. “The new deadline for the Transgaz sale is mid- September.”
Officials from the IMF and the EU, which granted Romania a 5 billion-euro ($6.2 billion) precautionary loan, are in Bucharest reviewing government progress on fiscal targets and planned state-asset sales, while a power struggle between Prime Minister Victor Ponta and suspended President Traian Basescu has pushed the leu to record lows and boosted borrowing costs.
 

Bloomberg